Jim Lenz:
Our guest for today is a clear expert in agricultural safety and health. Our guest dives into the hazards faced by grain elevator processing facilities and their employees. It’s clear that the commitment to safety doesn’t just protect workers. It nurtures the growth of our entire industry. Let’s get started. Hello and welcome to the show. My name is Jim Lenz, your host of Whole Grain, the director of global training and education at GEAPS, where the mission of the Grain Elevator Processing Society is to champion, connect and serve the global grain industry and our members. At GEAPS, we work to be the global community and thought leader for the grain industry, which feeds and fuels the world. Thanks for listening today and for joining the network of thousands of other grain handling and processing professionals across the globe taking strategic steps to grow professionally. The Whole Grain show gives you the competitive advantage to win at work so you can make more of an impact. In this episode of Whole Grain, we are joined by Jess McCluer. Jess serves as the vice president of safety and regulatory affairs at the National Grain and Feed Association, or NGFA. Jess highlights the critical importance of safety and health in agriculture, particularly in the hazard prone environments such as grain and feed facilities. Jess dives deep into the hazards faced by grain elevator processing facilities and their employees. He discusses a range of risks, from slips, trips and falls to regulatory compliance challenges related to equipment and machine safety. The focus shifts to the evolving safety culture and agriculture industry and increasing emphasis on safety programs awareness within companies. Like many other industries, the grain industry is quickly seeing more and more mergers and acquisitions. What does this mean for safety practices and communication of safety and health practices? All this has an impact on safety culture within an organization. We’ll touch on new enforcement programs and updates, such as the heat injury and illness emphasis program and proposed standards for heat prevention. The discussion then turns to latter safety and falls, with Jess providing insights into the changes in regulations and the industries efforts to address these issues. We finally just reflect on the value that associations offer in the industry. All that and more coming up next. Well, today we welcome Jess McCluer vice President of Safety and Regulatory Affairs at the National Grain and Feed Association, to the show. It is great to connect. Thanks for being on the show. I’m looking forward to the conversation.
Jess McCluer:
Jim, I appreciate the invitation.
Jim Lenz:
I look forward to chatting with you today. Jess, to allow our listeners to get to know you a bit and to add some perspective spirit, could you share you share with our listeners professional mantra or success quote that you live by.
Jess McCluer:
Well, I tell you what in my career working with trade associations and working with members, I think one of the things that I really go by is communication and facilitation Right. So I think communicating and having that opportunity to communicate with others, listening to different viewpoints and having the opportunity to facilitate those different views and practices with a wide variety of members, I think that’s really something that I’ve learned throughout my career working in this field.
Jim Lenz:
Thank you for serving as guests in the show and being such an ally to GEAPS over the years and the greater agricultural industry. You’ve devoted so much to the ag industry and your work and communication is so appreciated and needed. What makes working in the ag industry so special to you?
Jess McCluer:
One of the things I’ve learned is that, even though I never came from an agricultural background, I grew up in the suburbs but I had a lot of family members that were involved in agriculture, so I guess you could say I have an indirect connection but one of the things I did learn is that it is one of the most hazard industries, and this is even before COVID and even after as we’re kind of in the downside of COVID, those pre-pandemic hazards haven’t gone away. And so I think that one of the most important non-competitive issues is agricultural safety and health, and I think that that’s something that I’ve learned and seen that connection between all the different companies and the different organizations that are out there. Everyone has the same common goal, and so I think that’s been a great opportunity that I’ve had working for the National Grand Feed Association, working with GEAPS and others, and seeing how that is such an important issue to companies large, medium, small and, most importantly, to the producers, to the customers that they work with.
Jim Lenz:
We can’t talk really about safety enough. Well, there is, of course, coming up now, increased traffic at grain facilities and additional workers and demanding hours In the process of handling grain. There are so many risks at stake. Can you list some of those grain-related hazards at grain elevator and grain processing facilities that their employees need to be aware of?
Jess McCluer:
Sure, there’s several different types of issues and they vary, and so, for example, I would say that the highest number of injuries that occur in our industry related to slips, trips and falls. However, they don’t happen to be the most cited incident by OSHA. So, when you think of OSHA Federal OSHA, state plan states, when you’re thinking about the citations that they offer, those are mainly dentry, lockout, tag out, powered industrial truck machine guarding, fall protection. But then the most numerous types of injuries that occur are those that oftentimes, when you talk slips, trips and falls are related to fatigue, lack of awareness, signage, weather, housekeeping. So it’s really interesting to see the common types of injuries that occur, but then the ones that happen to be cited the most in our industry by the regulatory agency. So, when it comes to those types of issues, there’s some overlap. There isn’t some overlap, but I think what it really comes down to for both of those types of issues is the culture, the safety culture within the company, and having that type of culture to raise the awareness level, to raise the training to address those types of issues.
Jim Lenz:
That actually is interesting. Are you seeing sort of a change in safety culture in the ag industry? I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but I’m just kind of curious what you’re seeing because you have so many connections out there.
Jess McCluer:
I would say that is a very important topic and the time that I’ve been here with the association and, as you see, more of the companies, I mean, there’s been such a change within the environment, obviously with a lot of the consolidation and you have, I would say, fewer and fewer smaller companies, more mid-sized companies and as these companies are developing the program, after they’ve developed a safety and health management program, the next step is moving on to the culture. So that has become a large jurisdiction. In fact, on our webpage, on the safety section of the NGFA webpage, ngfaorg slash safety, we do have a session that we did in safety culture where we talked with the chairman of our safety, health, environmental committee about this very issue.
Jim Lenz:
Oh, very nice. You mentioned a number of those hazards with harvest season. Can you list some of those other things that are great concern all throughout the year, but maybe more so now?
Jess McCluer:
You know when you think about issues I mean, like I said, I always put my regulatory compliance hat there’s a best practices and there’s a regulatory compliance and when you think of within our industry one of the highest cited standards within the grain handling industry is OSHA and Bin entry, and you know that’s often times a topic that everybody hears about. But what it really comes down to is those steps you know for Ben entry, once that a decision has been made. I mean, every effort should always be taken to avoid entry. But if you have to go into the bin, the most important item is, you know, to turn off a lockout, all the potential hazardous energy sources, as I mentioned, a lockout tag out. When you think of lockout tag out, so many injuries can be prevented because of that particular practice. So I would just say that those are the two always most important topics that’s been in treat and lockout tag out, how they really go together. And then, of course, you know, once inside of bin, the specific practices to prevent engulfments and entrapments from never entering below a bridged grain or hung up grain, never walk down the grain, having an attendant, never being there by yourself, ensuring that there’s rescue equipment and following all the permit and safety precautions that you have within your company.
Jim Lenz:
Right along with that, perhaps I want to see if you could touch on OSHA’s new enforcement program. I mean, in general, what is leading the way for these updates?
Jess McCluer:
I think one of the most important ones right now for our industry is OSHA’s heat injury and illness national emphasis program, and so the reason I mentioned that is that the grain handling industry is specifically highlighted as one of the target industries within that emphasis program and OSHA is also in the process of developing proposed rule A one size fits all, if you will standard for heat injury, illness and prevention. So I give a presentation on standards and, with an attorney, talk about it as well. So there’s a lot of information. If you’re at www. ngfa. org/ safety, a lot of information on that can answer a lot of the questions that you may have about that issue.
Jim Lenz:
You have a chance here to talk a little bit about ladders and falls. Updated OSHA policy related to that. It might have been what was that? 2020 or 2019?
Jess McCluer:
That’s an issue. That’s an issue that NGFA We’ve been very involved in working on since that standard came out. In fact, that was a, I would say, one of the final rules came out at the end of the Obama administration, went into effect in 2017. And there are a lot of changes regarding ladders, platforms, follow arrest systems, cages and so forth, and handrails, guardrails, stairs. A lot of questions are out there that we in NGFA we work for both a lot of the manufacturing companies that are members of jeeps and in NGFA members questions, and it really came down to ladder height and platforms, and so there’s a lot of information that we have on safety section of our web page. We have guidance document on that and there’s also recently some letters of interpretation that OSHA came out. That really, I think, validates a lot of what our message has been over the last couple of years on that topic as well.
Jim Lenz:
Yeah, a lot of work to be done, keeping everybody safe. I appreciate your time with us before we go. You have, of course, been a leader for NGFA for a number of years and done such a great job for the organization and other associations as well, and you served as a leader for OSHA, but before that you were also a leader in the shipbuilding industry, and I’m from the Great Lakes area – big in agriculture, of course, but we have a lot of shipbuilders here. I’ve served associations, as well. In your words, what is the value of an association for those who are not members of an association? Some parting words about that.
Jess McCluer:
Sure, I had a wide range of experience working on different organizations here. I mean, as you mentioned, I’ve worked for the government, I’ve worked for trade associations, I’ve worked for companies. It’s been a great experience, I’d say. As I mentioned, communications facilitation, I think that’s one of the key parts of working on association and I think that’s a key benefit for the members right. So these platforms associations are the platforms. Just as you know, working with GEAPS as a professional organization, working with NGFA organizations joined they have that opportunity, through our organizations, to network and share information, share best practices, a way to really connect and interact and learn more about each other in ways to help the industry. And so we are a platform and we wouldn’t be around if it weren’t for these member companies and the time, effort and investment that they make. So we, as staff, want to make sure that they’re going to get a strong return on their investment by providing them with these platforms that they can use to share that information and best practices.
Jim Lenz:
Well, it’s been Thank you very much for joining us here on the Whole Grain podcast. We appreciate your time. Thank you, thank you. As we wrap up this episode, I want to express my gratitude to Jess McCluer for lending us his expertise in eliminating the vital aspects of safety in agriculture. Remember, the commitment to safety is a shared responsibility that reverberates throughout the entire agricultural ecosystem. This episode, like all our other episodes of Whole Grain, is super easy to share with others. The Whole Grain podcast can be found in your favorite podcast apps such as Apple Podcast, Pandora, Spotify, Amazon Music, Google Podcasts, and more. Just do a search for Whole Grain. You’ll easily find it. And don’t forget to hit the subscribe button. That way, every episode will be downloaded to your device as soon as it is released and you can quickly catch up on past episodes as well. Additionally, you can also connect with the Whole Grain show at www. GEAPS. com/wholegrain on the GEAPS website. Access the audio player, review the show notes and links, and access the transcript. We already have listeners from 45 countries at this time of recording. If you find value in the show, please give us a five star rating and leave a comment that really supports what we do and helps people discover the show more easily. The Whole Grain show is a production of GEAPS, the Grain Elevator and Processing Society. The Grain Elevator and Processing Society is the largest organization dedicated to advancing the grain handling and processing industry. Be sure to check out www. GEAPS. com. If you and your organization want to sponsor an episode, be a featured guest in the Whole Grain show, or if you are interested in us producing audio ads to support your product or service, we can help you with that. Please reach out to me, Jim Lenz, director of global training and education. My email is james@geaps. com. Have yourself a great day and thanks for listening to Whole Grain.
